A new online calculator developed by Hewlett-Packard and Govloop shows government workers how much they could save in time, money and CO2 emissions by staying home instead of driving to the office.

How much could you save by working from home? A new online telework calculator developed by Govloop and Hewlett-Packard has the answer. Launched last week as part of GovLoop’s online Government Innovation Summit, the calculator allows government employees to figure how much money they would save each year if they didn't have to drive to work and occupy precious government real estate.

Users can calculate cost savings for individuals or for a team and the amount of calculated money saved is broken down into hours of productivity saved, vehicle savings, and reduction in CO2 emissions. For instance, a single worker who usually drives 40 miles round trip every day, spending an hour in traffic in his midsize sedan, could save $3,850.97 annually by working from home just two days a week. Additionally, he would save 104 hours of productivity annually and reduce CO2 emissions by 1,466 lbs.

“By 2013, hopefully we’re going to see a change in more federal employees being able to telework because the infrastructure has been rolled out and put into place,” Christina Morrison, public sector marketing manager for HP told NextGov.com. “If people start changing the telework conversation away from simply working from home to focusing on the business benefits, we’ll start to see more executives on the IT side and the management side opening up their minds a little more to this change.

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Morrison also told NextGov.com that her manager now has five employees in five different time zones. "It’s a challenge. But there’s ways to figure out how to make everyone feel incorporated and part of the team … [Telework] will help managers figure out ways to motivate based off of performance and not the amount of time an employee is sitting at their desk.”